


Borne of Habit

by usedusernames



Category: Malcolm in the Middle
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Angst, Bittersweet, Brotherhood, Chaptered, Character Study, Depression, Ensemble Cast, Family, Friendship, High School, Humor, Minor Character(s), POV Third Person, Present Tense, Season/Series 07, Shared Bedroom, Sharing a Room, Siblings, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt, Teenagers, Truth or Dare, canon-tv
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2010-04-30
Updated: 2011-01-11
Packaged: 2017-10-09 05:53:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,654
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/83737
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/usedusernames/pseuds/usedusernames
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Extended version of 'Truth'.  After attempting suicide, Malcolm has to work at setting his life right. Possible Reese/Malcolm in future chapters.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

It's Dewey who proposes Truth or Dare.

Both Malcolm and Reese say it's babyish, God, Dewey, you're almost thirteen years old. But they go along with it so they can make each other do things that usually their few collective ounces of common sense dissuades them from doing. They intersperse 'Truths' for good measure; between Malcolm and Reese the questions are mostly about drinking and sex (they have a surprising amount of questions considering they're experienced in neither), for Dewey their questions are slightly more benign. It's kind of fun, even though neither Malcolm nor Reese will actually admit it, until Dewey gets his fist 'Truth' out of Malcolm.

__

_What is your biggest secret?_

"You can't tell Mom or Dad."

Dewey and Reese promise thoughtlessly.

"You know where I went when I cut class a couple weeks ago?"

"Arcade," Reese answers.

"No, I--well, yeah, for a little while, while I thought about it. Then I came home."

Reese gives him a half-smile. "Your big secret is Krelboynes don't know how to play hooky?"

"Yeah, Jackass, that's _exactly _it."

Then Malcolm starts chewing on his nails and they know it's a good one.

Then, now that they're paying attention to it, they see Malcolm's really mostly just chewing on the edge of his thumb, having already chewed his nails down as far as they can go. And they know it's a bad one.

He voice is stilted. He's choosing his words carefully, trying surprisingly hard to sound nonchalant. "So, I was thinking about it-- Kind of. Not really. I don't know. A lot of people think about it-- then I came home. And since no one else was going to be home for a while, I figured I might as well…"

"So you watched gay porn," Reese guesses. "Figured as much."

"I'm not gay," Malcolm answers automatically. He has to shove his hands in his pockets to keep from chewing on his nails, but they're back out again almost immediately. "Well, there's the knife Dewey cut his hand with, not the butcher knife, the other one, the one that's not totally dull--" Malcolm pauses. "You won't tell. No. I mean, there's no reason to, anyway. It's not like it's unusual; it's not like it's something you'd have to tell Mom and Dad about. " He suddenly speaks very quickly, "Suicidal inclinations, particularly in our age bracket, really aren't uncommon. And I mean I only tried once, technically; I only cut three, four times tops and it didn't even go in very deep and then I said 'Screw it', anyway, so it's not even like I really _meant _it. Okay. My turn. Reese, truth or dare?"

"I cut my _sandwich _with that knife!" Dewey screeches. It's kind of funny that that's the first thing he thinks of. He even thinks specifically that it was a bologna on rye. Then everything falls into place behind his eyes and he repeats "Suicidal." in this high-pitched voice that makes Malcolm a little sick.

Malcolm says, "Oh, _come on_, Dewey." in an exasperated way, like Dewey's overreacting.

Both his brothers are inclined to believe this is the case just so they wouldn't have to face the alternative. Dewey and Reese sit back down uncomfortably on Reese's bed. They share hesitant glances and watch as Malcolm moves onto his index finger, chewing on the slight, torn, almost-filmy edges of his nail. They both know they'd be willing to delude themselves if Malcolm would only give them a reason to.

"You write a note?" Reese asks, almost hopefully, as though it's the only way it could be serious.

Malcolm counters, strangely defensive, "That's cliché."

Reese freezes from the inside out; he can't _breathe_, much less move.

Malcolm keeps sighing over and over in an exaggerated way; he would be the epitome of annoyance if only he sounded annoyed. Instead he sounds like he's _trying_ to be annoyed, an actor not quite nailing the part. He paces in an awkward way; he keeps trying to stop himself from doing so after taking only a step or two in either direction, resulting in him being caught in a cycle of jerking, abrupt turns.

"Let me see," Reese decides finally. He lunges forward, grabbing Malcolm by the hands and turning Malcolm's wrists skyward. "There's nothing," Reese says with relief.

"Let go of me, Buttwad. I didn't slit my wrists, that's stupid! It's not e-" Malcolm yanks his arms back. "Look, it's not like you guys have to look after me, 'Oh, gee, _whoops_, we left Malcolm his shoelaces, now he's hanging from the ceiling'. It was, it was--" his eyes sort of go blank for a second, looking through Reese as he sits back down beside Dewey. Dewey and Reese know he's thinking of how to outsmart them, and they both involuntarily resent him for it. "An idle thought that manifested itself as equally idle action. Clearly I didn't go through with it. More importantly, clearly I could have if I was inclined to. It was a curiosity--an abject curiosity, but a curiosity nonetheless-- that I was compelled to explore and…"

He falters, just a little and just long enough for Dewey to cut in with, "You meant it."

It's funny how much impact the words have--Malcolm collapses into himself like a demolished building. He gives Dewey a long look that's not so much depressed as it is absolutely nothing. It scares Dewey enough to make him grip at Reese's hand.

Malcolm reforms himself brick by brick. He starts again, and this time it sounds perfectly sincere and un-manufactured. "Okay, it was stupid. It was really, totally stupid and if either of you ever did anything even _remotely _similar, I'd beat the crap out of you." He's usually a pretty adept liar, but this time he seems desperate; where honesty ends and dishonesty begins is clear: "But that doesn't mean I meant it_._"

He looks at them pleadingly. The tables have turned somewhere along the line. Suddenly Reese and Dewey are the ones who seem convinced of what his motive was and he's the one who needs reassurance.

They have nothing.

"Dewey," Reese says. He's looking at Malcolm. "Truth or dare?"

"_What?_" Dewey asks, horrified. "_What_ is _wrong _with you?"

Reese pulls down hard on Dewey's hand, yanking Dewey's arm just enough for it to be uncomfortable. "Truth. Or. Dare."

"Dare," Dewey answers miserably.

Reese relaxes visibly. "Good, me too. I dare us to tell Mom and Dad what Malcolm just told us."

It's probably stupid that this makes it easier. It makes it something to be caught up in; a goal to meet. Most importantly, in spite of Reese being the darer it makes it seem like an outside force is making them do it; they have to betray their brother's trust (and they know it still is a betrayal; maybe it's stupid to feel that way, too); they were dared to. Instead of the usual adrenaline rush that dares inspire, this draws away the fear.

Malcolm looks quickly back and forth between them. "You can't. You promised."

They shrug helplessly.

They have to.

They were dared to.

Reese and Dewey both stand fantastically in sync.

Malcolm's fingers lace behind his head. He sways a little like he's inclined to block the door, but he doesn't actually move. He breathes like his lungs have all at once been halved, taking in shallow and rapid breaths. He flings his arms out in an over-the-top gesticulation. "Okay, I meant it. You happy? I meant it. Everything got a little out of hand so, yeah, okay." His face contorts a bit and he looks away from them, but he doesn't cry; his eyes don't even get glassy. He's somewhere past sadness, somewhere closer to resignation. It's hard to tell what it is, exactly, that he's willing to accept. "Sometimes I want to. Fine. Sometimes it really--it gets-- You wouldn't get it. I can figure this all out by myself, okay? _I_ know what's going on. I know what I can handle, I'm not a little kid or something." He runs a hand across the top of his right thigh, absently. He's thinking hard and fast, eyebrows furrowed, strained at a task that's usually effortless. "So would you just…"

They wait for him by the door.

His fingers roll against his inseam, imagining the whitening scars. He'd cut too low that first time, too far over, funnily scared that he'd hit his crotch and have to explain it. Maybe not scared, exactly. The next few cuts had been hesitant, but they'd bled readily for being so small, and he'd known that just a little bit deeper and longer would do it, so he'd breathed deep and relaxed. He'd thought it was a good thing no one was going to be home; how could people do this with others in the house? His hand had gathered a cold sweat, so he'd wiped it on his shirt. He hadn't yet pushed the blade back down, but he'd gripped the handle and his hand was steady and calm as it hadn't been before. He'd blinked slowly and it made sense in an absolute way, the way it seemed to half of the time, contrasted to the half of the time it was, he supposed, not nonsensical but maybe-probably a bit of an exaggeration.

That was, with what seemed a surprising amount of coincidence, when Reese and Dewey had come home.

He'd cursed himself for losing track of time. How had he? He never lost track of time.

He'd thought to himself he would have done it if his brothers hadn't come in just then. If they'd run late, he definitely would have.

He'd thought it vaguely, then, a thought he hadn't really even had to think. A fact he'd already known.

He knows it now.

With a slight breath, he finishes weakly:

"..get Mom and Dad."

:--:--:--:

"How'd it go?" Reese asks when he's though.

"You weren't eavesdropping?"

"That's Dewey's thing."

Malcolm answers the question as though there were no interruption, "All right: Mom yelled, Dad cried, I nearly puked. I wish 'I cut myself' wasn't such a mundane statement around here, it would've made it easier." He lays back on his bed.

Reese stretches out alongside him. "You open with a joke like that? No wonder you bombed." He nudges at Malcolm's ribs with his elbow, but gets no response.

"I'm not joking…It took a while for them to understand, that's all. Probably took longer since I didn't particularly want to explain it." He folds his arms across his chest and shuts his eyes. "By the way, you get to babysit me until I'm trustworthy again."

"Really? Awesome."

"'Awesome'?"

"That means you have to do whatever I want, right?"

"Not exactly. But you can pretend, if it makes you feel better."

"What, I just get to sit and _watch_ you?"

"Yep."

"Damn, what'd I do?"

"I think it was that thing with the fire hydrant."

"Damn," Reese repeats. He's quiet for a long while. He turns his head a little to look at his brother. "I told you you could come to me."

Malcolm's eyebrows furrow as he racks his memory. His face relaxes when he finds it: "That was only because Francis screwed us over. Crap, Reese, that was _years _ago."

"Yeah, but now he's married, so he's pretty much escaped. That puts me on top again. Francis gets married, I'm in charge; I wind up in jail, you're in charge; you're a brain in a jar, Dewey's in charge; Dewey joins the circus--Well, Jamie's pretty much screwed. You know the rules. It was implied I'd take over all his brotherly duties. That means going to me for advice, butt munch."

 

Malcolm opens his eyes again. "No. I couldn't." He finds Reese's gaze so intrusive that it hurts to meet it, and he wonders what Reese sees inside him. "Not about this."

Reese looks up at the ceiling, wounded.

There's a long stretch of silence.

"Mom said she's calling Francis," Reese says finally.

If there's any outburst this would cause it's one of anger, but mostly Malcolm's just tired, so he just rolls over so he doesn't have to face Reese anymore and shuts his eyes.

:--:--:--:

Even though Dewey's gently shaking his shoulder, it's his little brother's cold feet on his stomach that wakes him up.

"Dinner's ready," Dewey says. He's sitting awkwardly on the bed, taking up space, legs bent at the knee--drawn in only slightly towards his chest-- instead of folded under him or crossed Indian style. There's virtually no room between them when Malcolm sits up but Dewey must not mind because he doesn't move. Dewey looks like he wants to say something, opens his mouth, closes it. Malcolm scoots past him to get up. Dewey follows.

Reese is obediently finishing up setting the table when they enter the kitchen, which strikes Malcolm as odd until he looks down at his own place setting. "Very funny, Reese," he says.

"Who's laughing?"

Malcolm narrows his eyes at Reese, but says nothing before he goes to the drawer to get new silverware.

"Get away from there," his mother says, stalling him.

He looks from his brother, to his mother, to his own food utensils which are small, plastic, but most importantly annoyingly childlike contrasted to the shiny silver of his family's. His hand grips stubbornly onto the drawer's handle.

Gesturing toward his place at the table, Malcolm appeals to his father, "Dad, what's--"

"I took them from the chicken place down the block."

"You stole a spork."

"Spork_s._ And knives."

"Oh, this is completely--" he opens the drawer and sees what his father meant. There are more plastic sporks and knives in there than they've ever had of legitimate silverware. He can't even _see_ the legitimate silverware for all of them. "Dad--These are free and I _still _think you took enough for this to classify as a felony."

"There's more in the car."

"Malcolm, get away from there and sit down," his mother interjects.

Hoping to placate, Malcolm holds his hands out defenselessly as he turns to his mother. "I just think this is illogical--"

"What do you think is illogical? That you have a family that cares about you? That loves you? That worries for you? That doesn't want you to hurt yourself? Do you think that's _illogical_?"

"No." This wasn't at all what he'd been thinking of, but the word still rings so false that it makes everyone feel uniformly and tangibly embarrassed for him. There's an underlying thought that his mother will ream him for it; she's never taken such a blatant lie, but instead all she does is look at him. Her gaze is disturbingly full of concern.

What he'd wanted to say, though, really, was that he's had these thoughts before, it's not as though it began the second they became knowledgeable of it; he's had them for months this year and for the entire summer before he started high school. And at night he'd sat at the table and sawed through his food and he'd never once cut himself, no matter how often he'd thought about it. That they're only really doing things like this to make themselves feel better. But 'I wanted to kill myself when I was 13 and nothing happened', sounds too boo-hoo-cry-more-melodramatic to be used in a serious argument. Besides which, he shouldn't begrudge them anything that would take the edge off their concern. So he doesn't say any of what he's thinking. Instead, he shifts, sits down, and says, "No. This is okay. I'm sorry."

He spears his pork chop with his spork.

:--:--:--:

The first night Malcolm learns that Reese is right: Dewey is an eavesdropper. Through listening in on Malcolm and his parents' conversation, Dewey had learned far more intimate details of the attempt than Malcolm had shared with his brothers. He'd learned that Malcolm had sat at home for hours refining the logistics (at which point his dad whimpered a little). He'd learned that what had stopped it was that he and Reese had come home (at which point his mother berated Malcolm for being selfish; Malcolm didn't protest). Although it didn't seem the most terrifying, the worst of the facts he learned was that the event had transpired in the bathroom. This, for some reason, was the fact that solidified everything.

This is why, in the dead of night, Malcolm says, "I swear, all I wanted to do in there was pee."

"Then why didn't you?"

"Stage fright."

"I wasn't _watching_."

Malcolm sighs and gets back into bed beside his brother. Dewey had been polite enough to sit cross-legged facing away from the toilet, but that wasn't really the point. The bed's more uncomfortable than usual tonight, and he shifts. Dewey shifts with him, apparently anticipating another trip. He can feel Dewey's eyes on him, waiting for any movement. Malcolm sighs again. The point, it seems, really, is that he scared the crap out of his little brother.

"Look." He rolls over to face Dewey. He knows he can't just say he's over it; he could possibly convince Reese of that, but Dewey wouldn't buy it. "I wouldn't, won't, at night. In there. I had it planned. You usually use it first in the morning, and you _don't _use it after school before Mom does when she gets home unless you lit something on fire and need to put it out in the bathtub, which, lately, is less than 15% of the time. I figured Mom could handle it. Maybe Reese, too. Not Dad. And you're too--"

The ending here is, of course, 'young'. Maybe age isn't something that matters when it comes to dealing with seeing something like that or maybe Malcolm just always hated being told he was too young when he was Dewey's age, but he doesn't finish.

Dewey blinks. He hadn't expected an answer this blunt. He thinks offhandedly that he'd be able to take it better than Reese could-- Reese and Malcolm have always been closer than he and Malcolm have-- but it's not really a right he wants to fight for.

"You could just lock the doors." He doesn't realize he's been holding onto the front of Malcolm's pajamas until it starts to hurt enough, making all his knuckles white and near-popping, that he's reflexively letting go.

Malcolm looks at him strangely. "You're right."

There's an unbelievably long stretch of silence that starts with Malcolm looking at him and ends with Malcolm looking through him, straight through his eyes and brain and out his skull into the wall. Then the covers are flung off and Malcolm's out of bed, to the window, yanking it open, and dropping down easily outside. Dewey's at the window after a few seconds of stunned stillness, looking between Reese's prone form and the darkness outside. His brain is dead. He tries to call out for Reese, but his voice is dead, too. It must take him too long to unfreeze, because by the time he thinks he has his voice back, Malcolm's hoisting himself back inside, screwdriver in one hand, eyes already on the bathroom door.

Who kills themselves with a screwdriver? Probably somebody, right? It's flatheaded, but it could be done couldn't it?

Dewey feels like throwing up. He moves to Reese, but Malcolm catches his hand, and Malcolm's palm is warm and alive, it's his own that's clammy-cold, and Malcolm drags him into the bathroom, locks the door that separates it from their room, and pulls him around and through until they're back on the other side. Malcolm drops to his knees in front of the locked door. He squeezes Dewey's hand and lets it go. "I'm going to show you how to jimmy it. Then I don't have an out, right? We're back at square one and we can both sleep? Okay, now just don't do this when Reese is in the shower. He won't even get dressed before he comes after you."

It's wrong of him, but Dewey hates it a little that it's taken this for Malcolm to do something with him one-on-one. Maybe it's more wrong that he enjoys it anyway.

:--:--:--:

Malcolm sort of expected the following morning to be different: You told everyone, now don't you feel better?

It was all just unfurling during the night, everything leftover from the confession was settling itself into place to make life right, but in the morning... In the morning, everything should be good again.

But, yeah, no. Not really.

The morning is exactly the same as every other, maybe even a little worse.

If he's feeling particularly cerebral about the whole thing, Malcolm realizes that mornings are composed of shoulds and wants and have tos.

You _should_ get up. Why? Because of school, you _want _to go to school, don't you?

So he thinks about it, but it doesn't seem big enough, so he tries again.

You _want _to go to school and graduate and go to college and get a job and be rich.

So he thinks about going to school and graduation and college and richness and finds himself apathetic. And it makes his heart hurt, because he's spent nights up eagerly thinking about this, hasn't he. Going over pros and cons of colleges and success rates and job growths and rolling his eyes when Reese looked at him funny over it. Why doesn't he care? He tries to make himself: Remember how you felt about this? Remember how the thought of Harvard made you dizzy you were so nuts about it? Think about Harvard. Think about Harvard accepting your application. But there's no excitement to inspire. Maybe it's just because there's no way they'll ever be able to afford Harvard. Or maybe even the possibility is too far away to count as incentive. He dismisses it.

You _should_ get up. Why? Because Mom will drag you out by your ankles if you don't. You don't _want_ her to humiliate you, do you?

So he thinks about the covers getting ripped back fast and his feet being yanked up above his head and being deposited on the floor. And he feels a squeeze that's almost fear because the mere threat of this got him out of bed so often once he got to be old enough to recognize it as embarrassing instead of just annoying, but now it doesn't matter. The sheets are warm and he may as well just stay here, wait, see if she does.

You _should _get up. Why? Because it's easier when you're up. You _want_ it to be easier, don't you?

So he tries to think about it being easier. It really is easier when he's up and going, like it's that first bike pedal down a steep hill and he'll be carried down by the simple laws of nature until he reaches the bottom around the middle of the day, and sure he'll have to pedal slow-slow-slow-hard-hard-hard-may-as-well-just-stop-here back up to the top after that, but maybe it's worth it. But the more immediate ease would come from doing nothing. From staying in bed, not sleeping because his brain's not tired enough to let him even if his body is, just staring at nothing and feeling the pressure behind his eyes and against his chest and thinking it would be even easier if he just--

You _have to _get up.

To this no 'why?' is necessary.

You _have to _get up. You _have to _get up. You _have to _get up. Havetohavetohaveto--

He gets up and it's a tiresome process of heavy legs and lamed arms and it's really not worth it but it's as easy to stay standing as it is to lay back down.

"You're up," Reese says, standing from his own bed. "Finally. Mom made me perv on you, watch you sleep."

Malcolm starts walking to the door. He says, "Gross," midway, like he had to look for the right response.

Reese tails him closer than is necessary to the kitchen, where the rest of the family already is. Once there, Reese separates himself from his brother. Malcolm fixes himself cereal, pours a cup of orange juice, and sits down.

Dewey has class today.

Reese and Malcolm do not. No special reason; teacher in-service.

Reese suspects this means the teachers are throwing a party under the guise of doing something professional.

Malcolm doesn't care enough to correct him. He thinks about why the lack-of-school didn't occur to him when he trying to use it as an excuse to get up, but it didn't much matter either way, so he lets it go.

"But I can't go to school!" Dewey shouts. "Only Reese'll be here! It's okay if Reese sees! Don't you even _care_?"

"Dewey, what're you-- Reese! Get your finger out of there!"

Dewey's mouth is open mid-word, but then his mother's gone, first off after Reese, then offering last minute advice to Malcolm, then back for a second to tell him to get going to school, then kissing his father goodbye and heading out the door. Dewey tries for his dad, but his dad shrugs into his jacket, then tries to touch Malcolm's shoulder--reaching out, pulling back, reaching out, pulling back, finally settling it in the air above Malcolm's shoulder instead-- Malcolm says "I'm okay, Dad." in a perfectly neutral voice before he continues eating his cereal, and his father strokes his tie, chuckles, "Oh, yes, Son. Of course." and hugs Malcolm so suddenly that Malcolm nearly chokes on his spork, leaving Malcolm to twist around awkwardly in his seat to return the embrace.

By the time his dad passes by to leave, all that's offered is a "Get to school, Sweetheart." before the door's closing.

Dewey huffs, unslings his backpack, opens it carelessly, and dumps its contents onto the floor. He yanks open the kitchen drawer, pulls out all of the knives, and drops them in. Malcolm watches him benignly.

Dewey seethes. He stalks over to the sink, pulls open the cabinets beneath it, and drops all three bottles of cleaner into his backpack, one by one by one. He stomps to the bathroom and clears out the medicine cabinet; snags the razorblades; goes to the tub and steals the plug. By the time he's done his backpack is heavy, full, smelling like Windex and sticking him in the spine. He walks back down the hall.

Reese must've thought he'd been left to watch Malcolm alone because they're standing together, pushed up side-to-side, when Dewey sees them again.

"I'm calling you in for school," Malcolm says, a little personality dragging itself into his voice. "Unless you'd rather see how well your plan of taking that bag into a roomful of Buseys works out."

Malcolm grabs the phone. Reese takes it from him.

Reese stretches the phone cord out like a gangster with piano wire. "Too ropy."

"Hadn't even thought of that one. Thanks, Reese. You call Dewey in; Dewey, you put everything back; I'm going to get my homework."

"You didn't do it already?" Reese asks while dialing.

"I have all weekend," Malcolm answers, walking away.

Malcolm comes back with his book bag. He opens it and drops his book, notebook, and pencil haphazardly onto the kitchen table. He pulls open the book and sits down.

Dewey's finished with the knives. He moves onto the cleaning fluid.

Reese hangs up and pulls up a seat beside Malcolm.

Malcolm's already tired of this and he hasn't even started. It was a mistake to get up, but it'd be a mistake to go back to bed. It's just a mistake all the way around. What he thinks he ought to do is drag Reese and Dewey outside to shoot some hoops; go roller-skating; do something not-so-ordinary. The ideas are all appealing, even uplifting, but at the same time feel too far away. Doubtlessly they'd take too much effort, no matter how energizing they seem right now, if he's barely up for this. He settles for the homework.

Dewey moves on to the bathroom.

Malcolm starts to read the text. Although the letters are sharp enough to seem legible, the words stay incomprehensible. He rubs his eyes. He reminds himself how many words he can read per minute and that this is a mediocre textbook at best. Only complete idiots couldn't understand it. This helps minimally, letting him gather the meaning of half the words.

Dewey comes back and takes up residence in a seat on the other side of Malcolm.

This is…creepy.

Malcolm starts writing.

His brothers keep staring.

And keep staring.

And keep staring.

"My pencil too sharp? Want to get me a crayon?"

"Nah," Reese answers.

Around this time, possibly even because of Malcolm's comment, Reese starts to notice something strange that maybe oughtn't be strange. After he's done writing down the answer to one question and is reading the information for the next, Malcolm starts absentmindedly stabbing himself in the thigh. It's always exactly the same place, stab-stab-stab, write, stab-stab-stab-stab. It's not a knife or anything. It really shouldn't matter.

Reese decides he's really being stupid, thinking it's something more than it is. Probably. He says, teasingly, "_Rink! Rink! Rink! Rink!_" in time to Malcolm's down strokes.

And he thinks it's pretty funny, so, yeah, he's definitely being stupid.

"What?" Malcolm asks without looking at him. "Are you calling me 'psycho'? That's kind of a cheap shot, isn't it? I don't like this arrangement any more than you do."

Stab-stab.

"I wasn't doing that, Dilweed."

Malcolm doesn't respond.

Write.

Stab-stab-stab-stab.

Reese chews his lip. It still seems serious.

Write.

Stab-stab-

Reese slams Malcolm's textbook shut. Malcolm sighs.

"The first time," Reese asks, "When was it?"

Malcolm's incomprehension comes more at the fact that 'when' was asked instead of 'why' than it does due to Reese's non sequitur. It takes a lot of effort to lift his hand to set his pencil down on the table. "Will this really help?"

"Yeah," Reese answers unhesitatingly.

"…Dewey?"

Dewey nods emphatically.

Maybe it will. He's been in therapy before. It ended with him bawling; Reese bawling; his mother bawling, but it'd still helped a little bit even if he had embarrassedly dropped the entire 'therapy' thing by the next day, ashamed at how much a stranger knew about his family and himself (it was more than all right if she had thought him unstable when he was acting; if she did when he was being perfectly honest was another thing entirely. He never found whether she actually thought he was crazy or not, but the possibility was more than enough.). He considers Reese's question seriously. "The first time I tried to," he says, voice even. He prepares himself, building up to talk. Maybe it will help.

"You only tried once," Reese reminds pointedly.

"Oh, yeah. Right."

Dewey and Reese share a look past him, but they don't really want to know any more gory details, so they don't urge him to continue this way.

"So the first time I…thought about it?" Malcolm continues.

Reese nods.

"…Years ago. The summer before high school. It started about two weeks in." He leans back to think about it. He has a fantastic memory, but he hasn't really dwelled on how he acted then for anything more than fuel for his actions now; one more example of how he's too bothersome to put up with. That entire summer he'd laid around in bed saying he wanted to die. To never wake up. He'd whined and whimpered and cried an undignified amount about the unfairness of life. Then he'd whined and whimpered and cried for being a wuss who whined and whimpered and cried. He'd walked around the house smelling like the clothes he'd had on for three days straight. He'd asked plaintively, 'Why does it _hurt _so much?' "You know, when I was acting like a total jackass."

"You meant that?" Dewey whispers at him.

Reese had punched him in the shoulder and told him, 'I'll put you out of your misery.' a few times and Dewey had made a day out of flicking paper footballs at him once, but mostly he'd been left to wallow until his mother had finally told him to cut out the theatrics. It really hadn't felt overdramatic then, even though, in spite of all his talking about it, at the time he hadn't thought nearly so much about actually going out and killing himself as he does these days.

It doesn't occur to him to be angry at his family for dismissing it then, because reflecting on it he dismisses it, too. He certainly wouldn't act so badly nowadays over something like this. He thinks the way he's acting now is probably the more mature way to go about it. Even though this time he thinks has gotten a little too vocal, it's still an improvement on before. He'd definitely exaggerated everything then, and he's probably doing the same thing now. He probably hadn't even really tried to kill himself.

"Malcolm?" Dewey prods.

Besides, the day his mother told him to knock it off was the same day he did knock it off--boom, one event and the hopeless, helpless feeling was virtually gone for so long--so it definitely wasn't that serious to begin with. He explains this, feeling cruel for worrying them, "No, I guess not. I realized it was stupid when we went to the zoo and Dewey and me almost got eaten by the tigers. So." He shrugs. "No, I guess I didn't." His stomach rises up in shame. What the hell's wrong with him? This is pointless. Is he doing this to get attention or something? Is being noticed for being smart not enough for him?

"When'd it come back?" Reese asks. It's a somewhat obscure way to ask, but Malcolm understands it.

"I don't know, recently. A few months ago, September, I guess. No-- If I didn't mean it to begin with it couldn't have 'come back', though, so, no, not recently. Never. It never came back. I'm sorry. This whole thing's stupid. I'm stupid. Let's just stop."

He must've said something he didn't realize he was saying, because Dewey's grabbing his hand again. He's not up for pulling away, so he's just going to let it hang limp in Dewey's grasp. But then he realizes if he's going to act like this the least he can do is try to be reassuring, so he squeezes back.

"So…" Reese ventures. "What you _need_ is a near-death experience that's worse than tigers. To stop it for good."

"Reese," Malcolm says tiredly. He looks at his older brother and feels his younger brother's sweaty palm in his, and he leans forward, rests his elbow on the table, and covers his face with his free hand as well as he can. He's thinking of how he must be faking even though it doesn't feel like it because who wants to actually kill themselves when they have so much going for them, and he's thinking he's an asshole for worrying his brothers like this, and he's thinking they really do love each other even though no one else thinks they do and even though none of them are inclined to say so now. And he's crying, damn it, and it strangles his voice and he hopes his brothers don't notice, "Reese, that's amazing: I don't even know what you have planned and I can already tell you about a million ways it can go wrong."


	2. Chapter 2

 

Malcolm’s mind is constantly working, several thought processes going at once, ideas overlapping each other, math problems being solved, homework—his own and his brothers’ -- being mentally corrected, that letter of intent to Harvard being endlessly revised. It has maybe a little less to do with being smart and a little more to do with some part of him being constantly restless and agitated no matter how exhausted he is.

In any case, for all of the loops and knots that make up his brain, his thought process of having what he could (but doesn’t) equate to a ‘breakdown’ at the kitchen table is simple:

Reasonable crying in front of his brothers isn't a problem. He's cried in front of his brothers when pets have died, girls have dumped him, things like that. Things that really suck and they all know really suck. So long as it wasn't over something stupid like chick flicks or getting punched in the face (Though Dewey had deliberately wailed over the latter a few times to convince them to stop hitting him, and for no reason they could think of they sometimes actually did.), it was all right for them to cry in front of each other. Outside of the obvious--pets dying, girls dumping-- it doesn't mean anything's wrong.

Reasonless crying by himself isn't a problem. He calculated the hours once, and between the summer he stayed in bed (fortunately taking up the bulk of his total) and the nights he’s used sobbing as a sedative, he’s spent a few collective weeks crying by himself. It's true that that had never necessarily done him any good. And it also probably isn't normal, which admittedly bothers him. Regardless of normalcy and regardless of goodness, he can't classify it as a problem. It isn't like he's going to give himself grief over it. There are no potential consequences. It still doesn't mean anything's wrong.

Reasonless crying in front of his brothers is a problem. The only outcome to this is bad. Dewey and Reese will sock him and, if whoever was in the bathroom last forgot to flush, Reese will probably hold his head in the toilet. And while he's gasping for air between dunkings, he will think it's amazing that Reese can't remember multiplication tables but can always remember if the last person in the bathroom flushed or not. Reasonable crying in front of his brothers might result in them all finding a distraction together. Reasonless crying by himself might result in personal catharsis. Considering the fact that the only relief to come from reasonless crying in front of his brothers is the knowledge that pee is sterile, it quite possibly means something's wrong.

Then Reese’s hand is on his shoulder.

Reese is _comforting _him.

Well, that cinches it.

There is officially something wrong with him.

It’s not that the thought hadn’t occurred to him. But he’d at best ignored it and at worst actively buried that particular ache deep beneath other thoughts and feelings and actions. First, because he really is normal. _Seriously_. Second, because it was something he wanted to keep to himself. It was embarrassing; guilt inducing; and something he needed to keep from his family, alternating between being for their sake and his. Third, he suspected telling his parents he thought he was (maybe, who knows, just a little, not enough to be mentally disturbed) depressed would get an, “Oh, Honey… of course you are! You’re a teenager.” from his mom and a “You want to get some ice cream?” from his dad. And he’d been pretty sure that, if he were to admit something was wrong, he wouldn’t be able to take it being dismissed.

But now, here it is. True.

And no one’s dismissing it.

His stomach seizes up.

That’s not any better.

:--:--:--:

 

There are some truths that are as simple but undeniable as the necessity of air, water, food. The fact that he’ll never be caught up on his bills. That he’ll never be able to buy a car that’s younger than all his children. That he hates his job. That he’s having to wear his reading glasses more and more often. That his heart’s like his father’s and he should cut back on greasy foods. These things are all easy, one-sentence truths. Truer than these, and simpler than these is that his family is the greatest accomplishment of his life. And even truer than this, simpler than this is that he loves them more than he’s ever loved anything or could imagine loving anything. Those are the simple truths that make up Hal’s life: He’ll never be out of debt, he’s getting old, and he loves his family.

Normally his days at work are filled with half-heartedly doing his job and whole-heartedly playing Tetris. That’s far more productive than what he‘s doing now.

He has his kids’ photos in his wallet. It used to be, when his sons were young, he’d be the photographer. It’s still this way for Francis, whose photo is slightly older and more dog-eared than the rest because his picture in Marlin's uniform just didn't look like him and there haven't been official opportunities since he's been emancipated, and Jamie, who‘s too young to have his picture taken anywhere but home.

But for the others there’re only school photos. Grumpy faces against the default gray background because they couldn't pay for color. Still, sour expressions and bleak backgrounds and all,  the photos are proudly tucked away and ready to be whipped out and shown to anyone with passing interest in his family. He has all of these photos spread out on his desk, now. He worked for precisely two minutes and attempted to play Tetris for another two before he pulled them out and started staring at them.

The clock on the wall is ticking loudly.

He‘s filled awkwardly with emotions that are both fighting and giving in to each other. With love. With pride. With anger. With worry. With fear. With despondency.

He looks at their pictures and he wonders what it'd be like to have to skip over a name, for there to all of a sudden not be an oldest, a youngest, a middle. Or to not skip over a name, because he doesn't think he could even if everyone thinks he should.

Nothing's happened and he's still more afraid than he's ever been in his entire life.

He calls home.

He’s about to run out of the office and drive back to the house when Dewey says, "Hello?"

"Don't you kids ever answer the phone?"

"It rang once; I don't think I could've picked up sooner."

He changes tracks immediately, gushing his love for Dewey for as long as his son allows. Dewey doesn't bother trying to talk to him; he just  hears a distant, "It's Dad." as the phone is passed over.

"Dad."

"Malcolm!"

"Dad?"

He rushes out the same amount of love. Malcolm is more restless about it than Dewey was. He can hear his son pacing and exhaling loudly, and his words are overriden with Malcolm trying to get him to hang up: "Reese doesn't even want me to use the phone."; "It's crazy, this whole thing--" ;"I'm sorry."

Finally he has to take a breath, so Malcolm cuts in with, "You aren't allowed to make personal calls."

"Of course I am."

"No. I read the worker's manual for you, remember?" Malcolm makes an awkward, high-in-his-throat sound that sounds a touch more tired than aggravated. "Do you want to talk to Reese?" and passes him off before he can answer.

He starts to say something, but Reese, too, cuts him off:

"Dad. Don't worry. We've got it under control."

Reese hangs up on him.

Reese telling him 'We've got it under control.' is very rarely reassuring. Normally it means something akin to, 'Now would be a good time to evacuate the house.'. Only under circumstances like this, when it comes to taking care of problems within the family, not problems caused by the family, is it something he's grateful to hear.

 

:--:--:--:

 

Nothing really happens for a while.

Malcolm eventually suggests they watch T.V., mostly so his brothers might stop staring at him.

Reese surprises himself by asking, "Did you finish your homework?"

Malcolm waves his hand dismissively. "I'll do it later."

That one question completely sapping any interest he may have in school, Reese shrugs and sits on the couch.  His brothers join him; Dewey on the right, Malcolm on the left.

Dewey shoves his hand between the cushions and starts snacking on whatever he pulls out.  Only loose change, which he dutifully shoves into his pockets, is safe from being shoved into his mouth.

He pauses, looks at his brothers, and holds his hand out in offering.

Reese takes a fuzzy mint from his palm.

Malcolm just stares at him.

Dewey takes that as a 'no' and retracts his hand.

There's nothing particularly violent on in the middle of what should be a school day. Antique price estimation for old people and brightly-colored talking dinosaurs for preschoolers.

Somewhere in the middle of something with a singing overdue library book, Malcolm falls asleep.

Instinct takes over:

Once they notice, Reese and Dewey start talking conspiratorially about what to do.

Permanent markers?

Mom's lipstick and nail polish?

This is where Dewey remembers.

Strip him naked and dump him on the front lawn, then lock the doors?

This is where Reese does.

They sit back quietly.

When Reese is scared, he takes it out on other people.

When Malcolm is scared, he makes himself out to be better than other people.

When Dewey is scared, he asks for help from other people.

But Reese has never been the one Dewey goes to for comfort and now doesn't seem the right time to give Dewey a hard slug in the arm, so they just sit and watch in silence.

 

:-:-:-:

 

When his mom had called and said, “I want you to come down here. We need your help.”, Francis had replied, “My help? _My _help? _You_ need _my _help with something? The great matriarch needs the help of a lowly commoner?”

In truth he’d already started packing, tossing necessities into his bag while he’d held the phone between ear and shoulder, but he’d prided himself on showing some restraint. If it were his dad calling, he’d have already been in the car.

He’d been happily thinking he’d get to lord this over her for the rest of his life and even more happily thinking he’d get to spend time with his family when she’d said it plainly, “Malcolm tried to kill himself.”

Francis had stalled as he’d folded a shirt. Along with ’I may as well start buying you casts instead of clothing, seeing how much you like wearing _those_!’, ‘Are you trying to get yourself killed!?’ had always been one of his mom’s go-to responses when he or his brothers acted idiotically.

This meant the words themselves were par the course of any kind of ridiculous behavior. It was her tone – serious and deliberately empty – that made a cold, wet, tangible heaviness buckle his stomach. And still it took him a minute to fully figure it out. He said, “You’re kidding.”, blank, nothing, to take up the time required for the meaning to sink in. Then he’d exploded with a multitude of things, swears and questions and a momentary, hands-shaking gasp of relief for it only having been ‘tried’, and more swears, climaxing with the accusatory, “How didn’t you know?! You’re his mother!”

Dead silence.

They’d both known he’d made a mistake.

To her credit, she wasn’t baited into arguing about her parenting skills or lack thereof. In a sick way, it would have been easier if she had. They knew that fight. One they could sometimes almost enjoy.

To his credit, as much as he had wanted the conversation to be twisted back to normalcy he had apologized immediately.

Somehow, he had lost track of his entire life for a while after that.

He’d made it to the car and driven long enough to have had to make a pit stop.

And now, several hours on his way home, is when he comes back to himself.

He thinks about how he misses out on so much, being so far away from home. He thinks about how much more he could miss out on.  He thinks about missing his grandpa's funeral. He thinks about how that day was the last time he talked to his family on the phone

Francis doesn't like thinking about that, about how his family could wind up in the hospital or die without his being there, could arrange everything and grieve without him being there. That rips away too much control of his life. So, instead, he thinks about how he can fix everything.

 Honestly, he’s read about this kind of thing. And heard about it. Because a couple of the guys in his A.A. meetings talk about how down they got; how that’s why they started drinking and how that just made everything worse. Because when he applied (and was accepted!) for the job as a camp instructor full of emotionally disturbed kids, he got loaded down with brochures and pamphlets and booklets, just to make sure he understood what he was getting into; the interviewer had given him such a large pile that he couldn‘t see past it to look at her when she said “God have mercy on your soul.”. And he’d read them all, and a few of the books had dealt with this exactly. Heck, he had even done a bit of research on his own, just to prove he was ready (considering what supposedly well-adjusted girl scouts had done to him, he figured he should do all he could to be prepared.)

So Francis thinks he’s in a unique position to handle this. He thinks he’ll say ‘I’m you’re older brother and I love you. If you want to talk, I’ll listen.’. Don’t push, just leave doors wide open. He thinks he’ll be able to design a game plan, write down steps to take, set up schedules, all of that.

He's ready.

:--:--:--:

Things at their house have a way of happening all at once.

One, Francis comes home. Francis isn't mad until he is, until he sees the house and realizes everything's fine. Technically. Everyone's alive, no one's in jail, no one's in the hospital. Everyone's home like they should be. And, suddenly, he's mad.

He’s in such a rush to add his two cents to all of this that he parks on their front lawn and storms up their walkway, leaving his car door open in his wake.

 

Being reamed out by Francis is like being reamed out by Mom. It’s harder to get Francis mad, but once he’s mad he hits on exactly the same points, albeit with big brother vernacular: ‘dink’ and ‘dork’ and ‘nerd’ thrown in between accusing idiocy and selfishness and thoughtlessness. And there’s no way you can actually argue with either of them; doing so just makes them increase volume. It’s better to just stare gape-mouthed back at them, unless they tell you to stop impersonating a fish, in which case there’s exactly no move you can make.

So he's gape-mouthed and trying not to get crushed beneath Francis' accusations. Because they're true, okay, but if he admits they're true he'll probably just crawl under the covers to keep from facing them.

Francis stops mid-word, says, "Dude, were you crying?" and shrinks back.

It takes Mom on her worst day to make Francis shrink back.

This is when Dad pulls up, driving like a maniac. Apparently using the lawn as a garage runs in the family, because he narrowly avoids tearing Francis’ door off its hinges. Dirt sprays up from beneath the tires and coats windows until the boys can no longer see out of them. By the time he's through, it looks like Mother Nature threw up on their house. It’s really no wonder they don’t have any grass in their yard.

Their dad runs in, lets loose a grateful sob, falls dramatically to his knees. He shuffles over, still kneeling, to Dewey, and hugs and kisses him. He gets up to give hugs and kisses to the rest of them, left-to-right. He pauses at the end of the line, and then goes back through them right-to-left.  He stands straight and looks at all of them. Used to having four boys in the house at a time, it takes a second to dawn on him that he's forgetting Jamie.

 Hal gasps in absolute horror at the thought that maybe forgetting Jamie for those two seconds could be the catalyst for something awful in fourteen years. He forcefully shoves his other sons out of the way to get to the boys' room, reassuring, "Oh, no, Jamie, Daddy loves you, too!"

Francis and Reese cast Malcolm a 'See what you did to Dad' look. It's not quite as harsh as the 'See what you did to Mom' look, simply because Mom's harder to break than Dad is, but it's still awful.

 It's even worse when they purposefully retract it to spare his feelings.

Dewey just wanders after his dad to inform him that Jamie's at the babysitter's.

Then, the trifecta, Stevie comes over.

He's the only one to opt for using the sidewalk.

He knocks politely.

Malcolm ducks his head and leaves to open the door.

Just as Stevie has gotten the fronts of his tires across the threshold, Reese stalks over. He slams the door shut hard, successfully sending Stevie rolling backwards into the street.

“Reese, you can’t keep him from coming inside,” Malcolm says.

“We could put in stairs."

It seems to be an actual, serious suggestion, and Reese’s eyebrows are furrowed and his eyes dark, and Malcolm has no idea what’s going on. So Malcolm speaks in his Reese-calm-down voice; each word clearly-enunciated and said more sweetly than normal. “We have an assignment. Stevie is my partner. It‘s due Monday.” He gestures soothingly, hands close to his heart. “This way you won’t even have to deal with me. Stevie and I’ll be out of your hair and you can do…whatever.”

“You tell him you were thinking about it?”

Malcolm blinks. “What?”

“He’s not coming in if he knew.”

“He didn’t know.”

Reese’s fingers loosen and lame around the doorknob. He and Malcolm stare at each other a second longer before Reese withdraws his hand and Malcolm pulls open the door.

Stevie rolls inside with an air of indignity. He and Malcolm start heading to the boys' bedroom, but Reese stalls Stevie with a firm hand against his chest and a sharp “You!”

Reese continues with, “How fast can you call for help?”

Stevie glances up at Malcolm.

“Don’t worry, he doesn’t want to beat you up or anything,” Malcolm assures. To Reese he adds sharply, “And you _know_ how fast he can yell for help.”

Reese nods. “Not fast enough. I gave him an Indian Burn and two Wet Willies before he called Mom on me last time.”

“Yeah, but remember how fast he yelled with the Nipple Cripple?” Reese starts to retort, but Malcolm puts his hands up in defeat. “Listen, if you want to stay with us, then whatever. I just figured you’d like a break from me. Okay?”

“Not that long of one,” Reese says, surprisingly cryptic to the innocent bystander.

A deep inhalation breaks their concentration.

“…What…the _hell_?”

:--:--:--:

Malcolm cracks his heel against the leg of the chair and there’s a sharp surge of _focus_. This is a relief in the way scratching a bug bite is a relief; a second of pleasure before the itch seems to reappear, spread out.

He forgets why he was so anxious to get Stevie in the house. There was a brief, legitimate flutter of excitement when Stevie was at the door. But now, though they've only just gathered at the table, he already knows he wants Stevie gone.

Actually, Stevie can stay wherever. Do whatever. He wants himself gone. He wants to get away from his family and Stevie and people in general. He's tired. He needs to do something, keep himself from realizing how tired he is. He needs to move, or plan, or talk, or something, just keep busy somehow so maybe he can squash everything else down for a little while. Take a break so that when he has to come back to thinking about_ it _maybe he can solve it. But he doesn't feel like actually doing any of that. He feels like sleeping.

Malcolm sags across the table.

Francis opted to leave them alone after declaring that this would give him time to get his plan together.

Reese is standing in the corner as if he's a body guard; his arms folded, his face drawn tight, his eyes burning a hole into the possible threat (which, in this case, is seemingly Stevie. Which sort of feels like a rabbit being a threat to a Rottweiler.). Just the way they make the secret service do in movies.

Dewey isn't Reese and therefore isn't going the 'The World Would be a Better Place if Stevie Kenarban was Dead' route; he's not watching for a threat and is instead watching for clues. He's also, again unlike Reese, using every trick he knows from having been a little brother to be utterly unobtrusive; within seconds Stevie and Malcolm forget he's there.

Their dad flits in and out, not sure what to do with himself.

The first time, he gets two feet into the room, spins around, and leaves. Stevie looks at Hal, but Malcolm doesn’t notice. When giving Malcolm a befuddled look doesn’t urge Malcolm to clear things up, Stevie changes topics:

"Are you still... in your pajamas?"

Malcolm bristles. "Yeah,_ so?_ There's no school."

His face burns as he remembers he thought there was. He has to pull it together. That can be how he stays busy. He can just focus on pulling it together. He drags himself towards the chair. Sit straight. Sit straight.

The second time Hal comes in, Stevie glances at him, glances at Reese, glances at the kitchen table they're sitting at instead of the usual desk in Malcolm's room, stares at Malcolm. "You...in trouble?" he asks, amused because that's typical.

Malcolm shrugs. "Ye--."

But then his dad's virtually on top of him, petting his hair. Overriding his voice with, "No! No, no trouble. You're not in trouble." Ended with a high, anxious laugh and a kiss on the top of his head. Which is _great_, Dad. Subtle.

Stevie quirks an eyebrow, what on earth was that?

Malcolm shrugs, it's my dad, you know.

That it's my dad shrug really shouldn't be used so often that it's an acceptable explanation, but Stevie nods.

The third time Hal comes in is precisely 53.5 seconds from the last time. Malcolm knows because he checked his watch six times in the interim. This time, at least, Hal finally does something. He asks in a desperate way if the boys want something to eat.

Malcolm says no. Even though 'I'm not hungry' seems a legitimate excuse, he's suddenly paranoid his dad will take it to mean more than that.  Maybe it is more than that, eating’s seemed a chore for a while, but he doesn't want it to mean anything. So he makes like it's due to being a charitable host, "Stevie's allergic to everything we have."

Which is true, actually.

His dad backs off, breezes out of the room.

Except he can't be a charitable host. Stevie's eyes narrow and he wheezes, "You're never... polite."

"Gee, thanks."

Reese stirs at his sarcasm.

Stevie continues, "Because you...act like...I'm normal."

That's discomforting, too close to a compliment. Malcolm shrugs, looks away, and dismisses it.

Stevie just sits there and breathes for a minute.

A whole, literal minute. Filled with nothing but Stevie's wheezing breath.

  
"I haven't...seen you in... a month."

Malcolm's gaze rolls around the room. "You know, if we're going to finish, we should probably_ start_\--"

"You didn't even...invite me... to your... birthday."

Right. His birthday. 17 exactly 28 days ago. Go for defensive. “You didn't come last year, anyway."

"I was in...the hospital!"

Scoff. "Like that's an excuse."

Although it probably says good things about their relationship, it's too bad that Stevie knows how he deflects things, how he acts when he's bothered. It means there's a slim-to-none chance that Stevie will ever wheel out on him for being a jerk when confronted.

Malcolm moves with exaggerated annoyance. His voice comes out fast. "Look, we didn't even do anything, it's not a big deal, sorry I didn't invite you, can we just get started?"

"I had to...call your mom… to even...come over."

The not seeing each other part is untrue, in the strictest sense, since they have classes together. The calling Mom part is definitely true. 'Stevie's coming over Friday, but, honestly, Malcolm, I'm not your secretary. Take your calls yourself.' is how she put it.

“Well, sorry." Malcolm says. "Okay? _Sorry. _Can we get started now?"

It's weird. He mostly is sorry. He feels guilty about it, when Stevie puts it like that. But his words are still upset, sarcastic, loud. And he feels guilty about that, too.

That part he doesn't apologize for, because it feels awkward and he’s tired of apologizing.

He bows his head over his work, eyebrows tightly-knit, and starts writing before Stevie can say anything.

:--:--:--:

When Stevie leaves, Reese sees him off gleefully. He waves and shouts and even pushes Stevie's chair to the end of the drive. He strides back to his brothers with a bounce in his step.

"What're you so happy about?" Dewey asks.

"Nothing." Reese sidles a bit closer to Malcolm.

Francis re-emerges with his idea.

Francis having an idea is nothing less than amazing. It's guaranteed to be good by default. And this is an idea that he actually seems to like, which knocks it into all-out awe-inspiring even before its revealed .

He presents it proudly.

'It' is a pocket-sized notebook with several smiley face and rainbow stickers and, drawn by Francis, a unicorn which looks quite a bit more like a deformed horse with a massive facial tumor, are all over the cover. Above the unicorn in bold, multicolored letters, are the words 'HAPPY THOUGHTS!!'

He passes it over to Malcolm.

Malcolm looks at it blankly.

Francis smiles smugly. "Each day I want you to write one good thing about yourself."

His brothers stare slack-jawed back at him.

"...And?" Malcolm asks.

"That's it!" Francis says, smiling and bouncing excitedly.

Reese glances over at Malcolm. "He's not a girl," he says slowly.

Malcolm looks at Reese, decides this is as good an argument as any, and nods in agreement.

"This took you_ two hours_?" Dewey asks in an incredulous screech.

Francis ignores Dewey completely.

"I'm serious. I know it sounds stupid, but if you're having bad thoughts, it helps to have something positive to counteract it. Right? So--" he taps the notebook. "In comes the book. To help you remember, and make you think about more good things, even if you don't want to. And stuff like that. "

Malcolm keeps looking at it.

On the one hand, he knows this has real roots in cognitive therapy.

On the other hand, his mind is empty when it comes to this. Good things about himself. He can think of only, 'Does well in math', which he figures is a lot like saying 'Fits well in lockers'. And from the look on Francis' face, it's supposed to be no big deal, it's only supposed to take a second each day, it's supposed to be easy. He can't admit that it's not. "And then, what? You're going to read it, psychoanalyze everything I wrote? No, thanks. I'm normal. I'm fine. There's nothing wrong with me."

"I didn't say anything was wrong with you. I'm not going to read it, but you are going to write it."

"How would you know if you aren't going to read it?"

Francis gets that look that he doesn't use often. The one that is alarmingly close to paternal (for most families--close to maternal for theirs--), grown from being a babysitter for years. "I won't. But this isn't for me, it's for you. So it seems to me you'd at least give it a shot."

:--:--:--:

Dinner is suitably awkward, as it was the night before.

"Well," says their mom, "Francis. I'm glad you're here."

"Yeah. Me, too," Francis agrees.

Nobody says anything for a long while.

Their mom's the first to come up with something, naturally.

She takes a deep inhalation, as though she's surprised to have a topic. They all look up at her.

They set down their forks and knives and spork.

Respectful.

They're actually being respectful.

"Did I tell you about Stevie Kenarban?" She asks, directing her words specifically towards Hal.

He latches on eagerly. "No, you didn't!"

"The poor boy, both his tires went flat not even a block from our house.”

“That’s a _shame_,” Reese says. His glee is barely contained, the corners of his lips twitching.

Dewey glances at Reese with a quirked eyebrow.

Their mom looks over at him, too. This is something she punishes over. It’s true there’s no proof, but circumstantial evidence is equally damning in her courtroom. But then she blinks. She retracts a little and continues, “Probably would've crawled home on his belly like a worm if I hadn't been driving home just then."

Reese looks legitimately disappointed now.

Their dad mumbles something vague.

Malcolm watches as his family returns to eating.

He's usually not the one to start hurling potatoes or sticking his hand into the pitcher of lemonade to yank out an ice cube. That's Reese's forte. But all of a sudden he wants to be.  He wants to do the things that Reese goads him into doing. He wants to do the things that make his mom mad and his dad stifle grins. He doesn't care if it ends awkwardly. If it ends with him slathered in creamed corn, yelling like a monkey while his family just stares at him gape-mouthed without participating. He just wants to do something to get a reaction.

But he's already done something to get a reaction; this is his reaction.

He has, quite successfully, with one action, ruined his family.

He doesn't think he has it in him to try anything after that.

 

:--:--:--:

 

Their dad makes them watch home movies that night.

Reese, Malcolm, and Dewey hadn’t known there were so many until they had snooped in the garage and found boxes of tapes labeled ‘FRANCIS’; ‘WEDDING/FRANCIS DAY 1’, ‘FRANCIS DAY 1 (II)’, going on like that until Francis was six months old. Their dad had chuckled when they’d brought it up, saying he’d had to make their mom knock it off.

None of the boys had believed this, their mom not being particularly sentimental, so they’d watched one. Malcolm had fortunately warned that ‘WEDDING/FRANCIS DAY 1’ probably meant they’d see their mom giving birth, so they had watched ‘FRANCIS 5 MONTHS 12 DAYS (III)’ instead.

It had, indeed, had their mother acting... doting. Sweet. “Oh, Francis, you’re so cute!” and, when his arms had given out, sending him flat on his stomach, after his first attempt at crawling, “Oh, my gosh, Francis, did you hurt yourself? Hal, we should take Francis to the hospital. His tummy’s so tiny, so sensitive!” Hearing their mom like that had been enough to scare them into being white and shaking, so they had ejected that tape and replaced it with the one that they‘d been in themselves, calming down when it got to a part where their mom started screaming.

In spite of the boxes filled with tapes of Francis, they only have a single tape with Reese, Malcolm, and Dewey growing up, with Jamie taking up precisely two minutes at the very end. Half a tape, actually, filled with several events over the years, the most important minutes of birthdays and Christmases, sometimes a year or two or three skipped simply because it was forgotten.

When they sit down, this is the one tape they watch.

Dewey and their dad are the only ones who really enjoy watching tapes; they like nostalgia. Their dad was the favorite kid to their extended family, grandpa included, but had gotten shuffled around in the enormous mass of siblings and cousins and uncles and aunts, not including the friends and strangers their grandpa had over for parties all the time. Dewey doesn't have enough things from his childhood to hold onto outside of his memories, for, to a large degree, the same reason; too many people, too little time. So they both like seeing what they have.

_It has Reese’s fifth birthday, when he runs his brand new remote-controlled car into everyone’s heels so often that his dad resorts to setting up chairs around the house and hopping from safe-zone to safe-zone. It has his mom confiscating the remote and saying, “There! It’s just a big Hot Wheel, now! Enjoy."_

Once she got all the recording out of her system, their mom realized she mostly has a good memory for both the truly wonderful and truly awful things. She doesn't need to watch tapes. Besides, she rarely has the time to actually sit and watch.

_It has Dewey’s first birthday. The week before, Reese had gone shopping with their mom and bought a rattle. Which their mom had thought was adorable. But, carefully, without her knowing, he’d taken the peas out and put it back together before giving it to Dewey as a present._

_Their mom yells at Reese when Dewey starts crying over the soundlessness and Reese lets rip with an absolutely maniacal giggle. Dewey's screech was honed to perfection over the years, but his pure shrillness was at its best when he was a baby. Eventually his crying sets off enough of the neighborhood dogs that their mom has to ignore Reese to try to shush Dewey with murmured 'It's okay's._

_Their dad, Mr. Cameraman, just tries to stay out of the way._

_Reese rolls his eyes and stalks off. After a few minutes, right after Dewey has quieted enough for their mom to calm down, he comes back into frame with a wicked smile on his face. Their dad starts to say 'Ah, Reese--' but he can't get anything significant out before Reese passes Dewey a lidless can of spray paint. Dewey babbles happily, waving the can up and down. Their mom is furious, and she snags the can from Dewey’s fingers. Dewey starts crying again. This time she lets him, focusing on Reese; her face contorted and red, eyes ablaze._

_Reese was never good at knowing when to just shut up.  
.  
Instead he exclaims, “_What?! _It rattles!”_

_All that happened after this was Reese had to scrub the toilet with his toothbrush. Still, even knowing what happened, their mom turning to the camera and saying, "Hal, turn that off," with deadly calm does make it seem more ominous than that when the screen goes black._

Francis says it's a bad idea to have video evidence of things the statute of limitation hasn't run out on. What he really means is he doesn't want to watch the fights he had with his mom when he was a rebellious teenager because he's growing up, he's still hoping to earn her respect, and he can't do that when she hangs onto the past. Not that he'll never admit any of this. He also won't admit he's just as likely as his mom is to pick fights over things that should've been forgotten.

_It has Francis’ fourteenth birthday which doubled as an acquittal. And the New Years that Richie drove a car into the tree in their front yard, surprisingly not because he was stoned or drunk, just because he said he wanted to and Francis had said ‘Sure, why not?’_

_It has thirty seconds of a Christmas when the entire family behaved. It went so smoothly that they had absolutely nothing to record._

_Outside of skulking around in the background moodily and one rather stirring conversation that has Francis declaring his manhood, their mother saying 'You'll be a man when you stop folding your underwear like a pig!', Francis asking, 'How do pigs fold underwear?' and their mother answering, 'They _ **don't** _.'., that’s mostly all there is of Francis on this tape._

__Reese likes living in the moment too much. He doesn't particularly remember anything that's on the tapes unless he kept mementos, something he can touch. A scrap of singed fabric or a box of his hair from when he had to be shaved for surgery. Holding something tangible like that, he can relive the emotions without sitting through the details. Seeing it all over again just inspires restless boredom.

_And, there. Not the end, but close to it. Almost exactly a year ago: a strange few minutes of Malcolm's sixteenth birthday. Their dad's the cameraman, like he almost always is. He's holding the camera a little low, thinking he's just turned it off instead of on. So the viewpoint is half-above-half-below the table, where Reese, Dewey, and Malcolm are all seated together; they're cut off at both shoulders and knees. Malcolm's still wearing a coconut bra and a grass skirt; he's taken the lei off and put in on the table because he nearly caught it on fire blowing out the candles on his cake._

_"Dad's trying to sneak a peek up your skirt," Reese says, and they all laugh._

_Malcolm crosses his legs with exaggerated girlishness, fingers laced and hands held protectively over his knees, and they all laugh harder._

__Malcolm doesn't mind watching his family; if he was there, he remembers the event vividly, but he can get caught up in the filmed emotions easily enough. But he hates watching himself. He doesn't mind having his picture taken, doesn't mind being recorded, but he inexplicably hates seeing himself afterwards. His voice sounds weird. His mouth moves strangely when he talks. His face is asymmetrical. He's embarrassed by himself.

He feels his dad’s hand on his shoulder, squeezing.

He turns his head, meets his dad’s eyes. Forces a smile.

:--:--:--:

They can hear their parents talking because they aren’t. They’re laying still and silent and breathing deeply when usually they’re talking and plotting and laughing back and forth and sometimes leaning into the open space between their beds to smack each other or exchange high fives or talk more conspiratorially in spite of the fact that there is no one to hide their words from. Theirs is a relationship that has always had the closeness of claustrophobia and only recently gained its discomfort.

They can hear their parents talking, voices cutting through walls, and it’s awful.

“You should’ve known? _I _should’ve known; I’m his mother.”

“And, what, I’m _just _his father?”

There‘s presumably an exasperated, loud breath here, but it‘s too low to be heard. “Oh, Hal, I’m not saying that.” A pause. “You know that game they all played when they were little? ‘Guess What Awful, Disgusting Thing I Have in my Pockets.’ I never guessed. I always _knew_.” Another pause. “I _know_.” and then a gross gasping sound, and they know their mom‘s crying. They’ve only heard their mom cry a handful of times, but it’s still a handful more than they’ve ever wanted to.

“It’ll be okay,” Dewey tells the ceiling.

“Sure,” Reese says.

Francis claps his hands together and says, "How 'bout we listen to some music, huh, guys?” This is one of his more family-friendly suggestions of distraction.

They on a whole listen to astoundingly little music, so they're stuck listening to a soundtrack from one of Jamie's T.V. shows. Within seconds a big, pink elephant named Hernandez is singing about how stealing is a 'Mucho bad, bad thing'. Malcolm has always been annoyed with this—‘That’s poor English _and _Spanish!’ but this time he doesn’t rant about it. Jamie rolls in his sleep at the familiar song but doesn’t wake.

Malcolm contributes nothing.

:--:--:--:

He and Dewey are, again, the last two to go to sleep.

It sort of figures. Dewey's that kind of little kid. If he thinks something bad will happen when he's not watching, he'll watch. Once he latches on to an idea, he doesn't give it up easily. He's patient, which is unique in their family.

He also has an amazingly tight grip.

"Are you awake?" Dewey whispers.

"Yes, Dewey, I'm awake. Just like I was two minutes ago."

"I don't see why you're mad at Francis."

"I'm _not_ mad at Francis."

"He's only trying to help."

"I_ know_."

Dewey remembers having a conversation almost exactly like this the day they went to the zoo. He remembers that by the time he was about to see the tigers they were fed up with each other, so he stops. He starts again, this time sympathetic. "I think the notebook's a dumb idea, too."

Malcolm shrugs.

"But I bet it'd be easy to do, so you might as well, huh?"

"Right."

"I mean, get him off your back."

"Right."

"Because it's not like you hate yourself or anything, right?"

Honestly Malcolm’s not that good of a liar, especially when put on the spot, so he answers uncomfortably, "I don't know."

"What?"

"I don't know, Dewey, maybe....Yeah, sometimes. So what? Nobody likes themselves all the time."

"I do," Dewey answers.

There's a beat.

He's annoyed by Dewey's idealism at the best of times. He and Reese have no problem trying to cripple it. But he can't do that when it comes to something like this. He's wondering how he can backtrack when Dewey cuts him off. Justifies his thought for him. "I bet you're just worried you  won't be able to think of anything to write.  That's okay. I can think of a bunch of things. I don't know if that's cheating, but we don't have to tell Francis, and I bet it'd be a lot of fun, anyway..."

Dewey keeps talking, babbling. He leans out over the edge of the bed to grab the notebook off of the floor without once letting go of Malcolm's hand.  He flips open the notebook to the first page, slides the pencil from the spiraled spine, and writes something down. He puts it back on the floor.

:--:--:--:

Sometimes he can barely wake up at all. He can sleep and sleep and crack his eyes open and feel so heavy that more sleep seems like a reasonable solution.

Sometimes, he wakes up in the middle of the night feeling nauseous.

There’s never a good reason for it, at least not one he can figure out so late in the night. It’s just a sudden, pointless churning in his stomach that says his immobility is bigger than just sleeping, is all-consuming, and he should get up and _do _something to get moving again

Malcolm has at his disposal a slew of defenses against anxiety. Except it’s not really against _anxiety_, per se. They’re just things he does to keep it from feeling like he’s somehow breathing wrong, air piling up outside of his lungs and pressing down on them instead of filling them up. Or to keep his stomach from feeling like it’s eating itself. Thinking it might be because of_ anxiety_, which is a legitimate problem, and not to ward off some nameless stomach cramps or reasonless inability to breathe right, makes him more anxious (except not actually anxious). So he doesn’t think about that.

He used to chew his nails. He gave that up by himself by stuffing his hands under his armpits for a week. When kids teased him for doing that, he’d pretended he was just being cool and aloof.

After nail-biting came pacing. He stopped that one when his grandma told his mom, “Look at him! Like an elephant, tromping around! No wonder your carpets are such crap.”

After pacing came tooth-grinding. His mom decided to get him a night guard with the humiliating intention of making him wear it around the house during the day, since that was when he actually prone to grinding. That was enough for the habit to subconsciously end itself.

Talking had always been there, but after tooth-grinding it came to the forefront. Talking was a safe bet. Talking was part of personality. People might tell him to shut up, or avoid him, or yell at him, but there were few who would actually out-and-out tell him to change his entire personality.

So. His jaw is sore, tight, and keeps popping as his teeth drag against each other.

He intermittently chews at the nails of his free hand until three of his fingertips are dotted with blood.

Talking to himself out loud always feels strange so he doesn't try it, but his brain's whirring madly.

And he still feels like hurling.

  
He looks at the clock and it’s 12:15 and that’s too late, _too late_. He glances down-and-over at Dewey.

Normally what happens when he wakes up like this is: he gets up, gathers his homework to trick himself into thinking he's being productive, goes to the kitchen, and sits down. He manages to work for three, four, five minutes, aware of every. Single. Passing. Second. Frustrated. He'll get up, probably peer into the fridge even though he's not hungry, walk around the room, sit down, work. Lather, rinse, repeat. An hour or two and he'd have something finished, though he'd avoid reading it over just in case he hated it, and he'd be able to go back to sleep.

He couldn't do this last night. That would have been endlessly more embarrassing than not-peeing in front of Dewey.

He unlaces his fingers from his little brother’s. Waits a second to see if Dewey will wake up.

Dewey used to beg to hold his hand all the time whenever they had to walk together. Dewey had only ever begged for him, probably because, while Reese had let it be known that he wasn’t against punching whiny little hand-holders, he had only complained, rolled his eyes, and opened up his palm for Dewey’s.

Dewey had always been a grabby kid, always picking things up, touching them, but he’d given up on hand-holding by himself a little while after he turned ten. Thank God.

Malcolm wonders dully how long it’ll take to break the habit this time.

He carefully steps over Reese, who Francis shoved from the bed, grabs his stuff, and heads to the kitchen.

He hesitates in the doorway.

He watches his dad, sitting at the table.

He’s taken a small step backwards when his dad looks up.

"Malcolm."

"Dad."

He can't remember a time they were so awkward with each other.

"Sit down." Eager. Excited. Tired. Sad.

"That's okay, I was just..." He goes over and sits down. It's his dad's face that makes him. It looks old. Eyes red, maybe from not sleeping, maybe from crying, Malcolm doesn't really want to know. "Dad."

His dad pats his hand and he wants to pull away. He's never wanted to pull away before. But this kind of love is smothering. He drops his backpack on the floor and the thud is magnificently loud. His dad flinches at the sound.

"Dad," he says again. "It's okay. I'll figure it out." He will. He will because he's smart, right? He's a genius, this is nothing, he can find a solution.

His dad looks at him seriously. Considers him.

He isn't reprimanded by his dad often, and he's not sure that's what's happening now, but that's what it feels like. A sharp stab of fear. An ache of embarrassment, of guilt. He wants to apologize, wants to leave but wants to get it over with, whatever 'it' is.

Hal's looking at his son, seeing the little boy who let him kiss scraped knees. Who still slept with a teddybear after hours of playing with his chemistry set. Who said 'I love you, Daddy!' without being prodded into it. Who made a raggedy father's day card on the same piece of paper he'd solved some of Francis' math problems on. A happy, healthy son who he knew would go on to do great things.

  
“If you ever feel…_that way_ again, would you tell me?”

Malcolm curls his fingers in towards his palms and stills his bouncing knees, subconsciously, self-consciously. His pencil rolls from his hand. He looks down at his knuckles. “I guess so.”

“No,” his dad says, not loudly but so sharply that it makes him look up. “No guessing. Would you or wouldn’t you? There‘s no,” a meaningless gesture, “wrong answers here. Just yes or no.”

“Yeah, I’ll tell you,” he says.

His dad sink back into his chair, relaxed.

Malcolm's guts twist up tighter, pushing the sick feeling up higher, and he presses his palm to his stomach in a lame attempt to calm it.

“We never had to worry about you,” his dad says.

“Yeah,” he says. “I know.”

His dad had explained it to him this way, right after Jamie had been born: Francis was the oldest and was always getting into trouble, Reese was….Reese, Dewey was smart but not _freaky _smart and, anyway, had been the youngest for so long it seemed natural to still see him that way, and Jamie really was a baby. They were lucky to have one son who didn’t need looking after all the time.

It’s a weird thing to be proud of, but it always meant that when his parents overlooked the problems he told them it wasn’t just because he was the middle kid, or the least important kid, but at least in part because he was the kid who didn’t need his parents to fix things for him. He pauses, frowns, suddenly guilty that he needs them to fix it now.

"So. Why're you up?"

He sees his dad glance over at the silverware drawer, but he pretends not to. "Homework."

His dad gives him a disbelieving expression.

"I do it this late all the time."

It's all the time now, now that he can't bother finishing the majority of his work before he leaves school. But even before, between school, work taking up the bulk of his weekends, college prep courses, extracurriculars to pad his resume, going over Reese and Dewey's schoolwork, and still squeezing in time for something he actually wanted to do, doing his own homework got pushed into the late hours of the night or crammed in during lunch breaks. It wasn’t so bad. He’s smart. He’s lucky. He’s expected to make sacrifices. His mom’s told him that plenty of times.

“Let me help you,” his dad says suddenly.

 

“What?”

“Let me help you, it’ll be fun.”

“Dad, there’s a reason you haven’t helped me with my homework since kindergarten.”

“_Kindergarten? _Whoo! Well, then it’s been too long. Huh?” His dad says excitedly, cuffing him on the shoulder. His dad chuckles, high up in his throat, and it’s awkward and nervous and desperate so Malcolm relents.

“Yeah. It’ll be fun.”

It takes about fifteen seconds before ‘helping’ turns into ‘shouting encouraging words from the sidelines’. His dad gets so into it that it eventually wakes his mom up.

She pads out to the kitchen ( hair a mess, face still lined from sleep), folds her arms, and just smiles at them.

It’s not fun. The action itself makes him feel exposed; bared and vulnerable and self-conscious.

But his mom and dad seem happy and so he doesn’t mention it.

If this is the sort of thing that will convince them he’s not screwed up, he’ll do it. If this is what it takes for them to get back to ‘normal’, such as it is, he’ll do it. He can fake being all right. He’s been faking being all right. Maybe if he fakes it long enough he’ll start to believe it as truth, himself.

Even if he doesn’t, it isn’t worth it to break his family just to put himself back together.

**Author's Note:**

> Episodes referenced so far/Episodes I'm planning to mention: Smunday (S1), Therapy (S2), The Grandparents (S2), Zoo (S4), The Baby Pts 1 and 2 (S4), Kitty's Back (S6), Malcolm's Money (S7), Mono (S7), Stevie in the Hospital (S7), Graduation (S7).
> 
> Episodes that aren't referenced specifically but have been used as basis: Malcolm Holds his Tongue (S4), Thanksgiving (S5), Block Party (S5), Malcolm Dates a Family (S5), Jessica Stays Over (S7).


End file.
